The voice of air cargo since 1986: The STAT Trade Times

Some of the multi-billion-dollar businesses we see today began in the most modest of places — a tiny garage on the outskirts of a city, a college hostel room, a canteen conversation, or even a quiet corner of a corporate boardroom. While their origins were different, the founders shared a few powerful common traits: a brilliant idea, a problem-solving mindset, and a clear vision — either to solve an existing problem or to create something that did not exist before.

How did the iPhone become popular in a world dominated by Motorola, BlackBerry and Nokia?
It created something that did not exist before.

Similarly, 40 years ago, air cargo existed — and so did its stories. But only a very few were chronicling them, and even fewer platforms were dedicated to giving those stories the attention they truly deserved.

Even today, we order products from our mobile phones and receive them the very next day from a country 10,000 miles away. What we often miss is the story behind that journey. An e-commerce parcel arriving on time from across the globe may not seem very dramatic. But imagine two cheetahs travelling from Botswana to Madhya Pradesh for India’s ambitious wildlife reintroduction project. Or think of 20 prized horses flying from Liège to Dubai or Hong Kong for a championship race. Formula 1 cars moving from Singapore to the United States. Sharks, lions, vaccines — all transported from one corner of the world to another.

In the early 1980s, goods were already moving by air. A few did tell the story, but there was no dedicated platform focused solely on air cargo. That gap led to the birth of The STAT Trade Times.

This was a time when the internet had not yet arrived, and television was still a distant dream in many households. Radio and newspapers existed, but air cargo rarely found space on front pages or radio bulletins. Yet cargo deserved a voice. It deserved to be heard.

And so, in 1986, R K Patra founded The STAT Trade Times — a platform where cargo stories could take flight and reach thousands across the world.

Let me share a travel story about the founder of The STAT Trade Times, R K Patra, from a time even before The International Air Cargo Association (TIACA) existed in its present form.

In 1988, he happened to travel on the same flight as late Ratan Tata, then Chairman of Air India, who was on his way to moderate a panel at the Air Cargo Forum in Miami, organised by SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) — an event that would later evolve into the TIACA Air Cargo Forum.

Curiosity sparked a conversation. Meetings followed at the forum. And during one such interaction, the discussion turned to the bold thinking behind Tata’s diversification into everyday consumer products, particularly salt.

By then, Tata Salt had already been launched and was steadily becoming a household name across India. But what intrigued Patra was the simplicity and scale of the idea.

He asked Tata, “From steel plants to airline, what made you enter something as basic as salt?”

Tata responded with a smile, and a question of his own.

“What’s the population of India?”

“Over a billion,” Patra replied.

Tata smiled again. “Then you have your answer. Everyone (irrespective of their financial condition) can pay a rupee.”

It was a simple insight backed by scale. Salt is essential in every home. Even a rupee from each person, multiplied by a billion, becomes transformative.

That conversation was not just about salt. It was about vision, about recognising opportunity in the everyday, about thinking at scale, and about believing that even the simplest idea, executed well, can become a billion-rupee enterprise.

In that same spirit, we continued telling air cargo stories, stories that not only documented the industry but shaped conversations, influenced leaders, and connected stakeholders across the global cargo community.

Since 1986, we have been telling the stories that matter, uninterrupted for 40 years, even during wars, natural disasters, and global crises.

From vaccines transported by air cargo saving millions of lives, to a baby elephant flying from Sri Lanka to China as a royal gift; from a rare baby rhino moved for a conservation programme, to fresh-cut flowers flying from Africa to Europe; from humanitarian aid reaching war-affected regions, to rare dinosaur bones travelling from the United States to Abu Dhabi for a museum exhibition; from a 24-karat gold trophy flown in for a football championship, to the life-saving movement of a human organ — air cargo has done it all.

And The STAT Trade Times has covered it all.

As we celebrate four decades of storytelling from the world of air cargo, we relive those defining moments and share them with our readers.

But as the saying goes, change is the only constant.

From the very first print issue in 1986 to today’s digital platforms and social media, The STAT Trade Times has evolved continuously — reaching people wherever they are. Along the way, the air-cargo-focused media company expanded into video storytelling, original interviews with top industry executives, documentary-style series, and conferences and events around the world.

With each new chapter, The STAT Trade Times has taken new flights and reached new heights.

And for four decades, our mantra has remained the same:

To inform. To inspire. To connect the global cargo community.